Coming to terms with privilege

I21

We need to know what we don't know. We need to know our privileges, our intellectual, social, economic privileges and how they actually intersect with other people. Not to feel guilty all day long not that…[w]hiny, guilty shit. We are unable to cross over because we don't know what we don't know. So we actually believe everybody in the world lives like we do, we actually believe that nobody goes to church, we actually believe that nobody lives in the suburbs, we believe all of that. I don't know how we've come to believe these ridiculous untruthful things but we've come to believe them.

Building solidarity, not conflict

I3

I do believe that non-violent action is more effective as a strategy because the object is to build solidarity rather than conflict and I feel that that is ultimately what we're fighting for. Certainly I feel that non-violent action is more effective just by the very nature of what it is. It's less alienating to people who are largely ignorant of the issues that are being confronted. That it's less intimidating and therefore approachable and it's easier to communicate with people through it.

Fight to survive

I9

People talk a lot in certain activist circles of non-violence, civil disobedience, which is a disruption but what's to happen if and when the police and military are actually pushing people down, even killing people? At what point are people going to fight? If you just say, ‘well, never,’ then that doesn't look very good and I don't think it's even possible for people to just resign themselves to that, people won't. People will fight to survive.

Youth of colour fight back

I1

Some of the really inspiring stuff that I've seen...since September 11th, 2001 has been...immigrant and refugee youth taking on leadership roles, oftentimes beginning with the fightback that they're seeing in their own communities but extending well beyond that...to a far broader social perspective.

Confronting structures of domination

I28

Organizing can be a space where actions can come out and thinking can be engaged...goal setting, and thinking, and...active critical analysis can happen because we don't live in a vacuum….[I’m interested in] the ability to translate...thoughts into the world we want to see…[through] the actions that we engage in, especially when they're explicitly aimed at challenging and confronting white supremacy, patriarchy, capitalism, other structures of domination.

Marginality and denial

I2

More and more I see an obsession with state repression and class power [as an avoidance tactic].....If you're framing those themes as separate [from] race and gender and sexuality, what's up?...It's either an avoidance or a direct minimization of those experiences which is appalling and no wonder you're marginal because you're denying the reality of the majority of people.

Precarity and inertia

I9

I think...one of the most present problems right now is...how precarious everything is around us in terms of our living spaces, we have no control over [them], we...pay all this rent [and] it's just burned off….The places we work, we have no control over the vast majority of them so that we're just thrust around here and there. We're fired with no notice, we have to deal with all kinds of unfair working conditions depending on the whim of the employers and this creates a lot of problems for everyone. We're stressed out, we're just left with no energy and time at the end of the day other than to watch TV or zone out or whatever.

Accelerating the collapse

I2

I think that the whole concept of shit hitting the fan is a weird way to refer to a collapse that's already in progress and that's depressing. I feel like there's going to be an acceleration that could be really fast.

Reimagining development

I31

To what ends are we growing this economy? I think there's sort of three fundamental objectives of development in the twenty-first century: low carbon because of climate change, adapting to climate change, [and] reconciling some of the differences that exist within the current system. We need low carbon development and we need to create food security, energy security, and robust, resilient systems that people will be able to provide for their needs, and provide for their families, and so on. It's pretty simple. It's not growing the economy, because that's what got us into this mess in the first place.

Solidarity against the prison-industrial complex

I12

Definitely supporting people who have had their freedoms taken away by the prison system and by the state...is one of my political priorities and I do that through doing fundraisers, letter writing... staying updated is another important priority. I try and check websites that have updates of global resistance movements regularly.